S Department of Energy (DOE) is working to build an energy system for the future which is cleaner, more efficient, and more reliable than current technology in order to ensure our nation's energy security and environmental viability. The DOE sees hydrogen as a potential answer to satisfying many of our energy needs, in addition to reducing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions. The following is a summary that demonstrates how hydrogen can affect everyday life, while providing benefits to the environment, technological advances, and economic growth.
The cost of energy (electricity) derived from hydrogen fuel cells vary depending on time, place, and economic conditions. Costs can be increased or decreased incrementally by transferring the created electricity to and from hydrogen fuel cells via the "grid". The grid is the superhighway of interconnecting wires that feeds its consumer needs from large power plants. It is currently the most efficient way of getting energy from a source to a consumer. A hydrogen fuel cell can act in many different ways as a complement or substitute to the grid. .
Most places that utilize fuel cells as of present day are hospitals, hotels, and energy authorities such as the New York Power Authority. These places can generate electricity from a network that connects the grid with the fuel cells to create an interactive environment. In very particular cases, a company that utilizes fuel cells may be able to use energy from the grid while it's cheaper, and conserve the fuel cell stock of hydrogen and then strategically sell the electricity produced from the fuel cell when prices rise. Another option would be to use the electricity produced at the lower price by the fuel cell in place of the rising price charged by suppliers over the grid. .
The ability to exchange power sources between the grid and the fuel cells involves a lot of hardware, as well as the decisions of many people within a firm as to the right time, place and price at which each source of energy can be utilized optimally.
